Tag Archives: kids blog

Verbatim. Me: Mom, what we should serve for your birthday, cake, pie, something else? Mom: Cake. Specifically cupcakes. Me: What flavor do you want for these cupcakes? Mom: Oh I don’t know…

And I said (in my head) WE WILL HAVE ALL THE FLAVORS! And, Neapolitan cake was to be made. I know I am not the first person to attempt colored or layered cakes, so this is not new. But, I have to say it turned out cute enough that I wanted to show it off. And, yes, yes you can do it too.

Starting off with 3 cake batters, Strawberry, Chocolate and Vanilla, I made an 8″ round of each. I had SO much leftover batter that I thought I’d attempt the cupcakes as well, since they were specifically requested. During their cooling, I made a Vanilla Bean Buttercream, as well as a Strawberry Buttercream, and a Milk Chocolate frosting. I’m such an overachiever.

From the photos of the cake you can see that I layered the chocolate on the bottom, put down some of the Vanilla Bean Buttercream, then layered the Vanilla, put down some of the Strawberry Buttercream, and placed the Strawberry layer on top, and covered the entire thing in the Milk Chocolate frosting. The assembled cake then went into the fridge while I started on the cooled cupcakes.

In my humble opinion, the candies you see on the tops of the cupcakes were proportionally too big. I searched high and low for the old school Brach’s Neapolitan candies, they are the perfect square shape and I would have used those to decorate the cake and cupcakes. Couldn’t find them to save my life – gone are the days of the Brach’s candy dispenser displays at grocery and drug stores. Le sigh. So, in a crazy what-are-the-odds kind of day, while with my daughter at Michael’s we spied the old school Neapolitan candy bars!! Snapped up 4, and took home to cut up. I knew I needed a piece to top the cupcakes, but couldn’t decide how to decorate the cake. I had a ton of Strawberry Buttercream, but not as much Vanilla Bean or Milk Chocolate frosting left to use. So, we came up with what you see in the pics below – I think it turned out super cute. I failed to get a pic of the inside of the cupcakes, but it was exactly how it should be, as I had layered each type of batter on top of another. They all tasted sublime too – a fresh Strawberry Buttercream is divine, by the way. You should definitely try it out. Even for a chocoholic like myself it warranted multiple tastings right out of the mixer bowl!!!

First when we got out of the car to go to lunch mom and I both got vanilla milkshakes (medium) and when they got to the table Mom’s shake got hijacked by Reagan. So now it was more like Reagan sharing with mom instead of mom sharing with Reagan.

Back in the🚙. Today was supposed to be the shortest day of driving which it was. I made a funny face and Reagan cracked up😂. That’s 👍 because if she cried I could always make her be 😃. Except for one time when I just wanted to 👊 her.

Yay we’re at our camp site. So we ate dinner and I said “I wish Joe were here” then I just did this 😭. Then GOOD NIGHT!

So today Reagan woke me up at 9:22 AM and mom and dad were still asleep. We were pretty bored because there was nothing to do that wasn’t noisy until Reagan decided to scream. Then it was fine because now we could do something noisy. So we turned on the T.V. and it was fine. I don’t know if I have said this enough in this blog but IT’S POOL TIME! Oops I forgot something. YAY!

Ok their breakfast was amazing at the hotel. I got the waffle and it had a fruity face.

Oh NOOOWW it’s time to get in the pool, it was pretty cold but I got used to it.

Then we all took a shower and left. 30 MINUTES LATER (pretty much).

Now entering ZION! We set up camp, ate dinner which was mac&cheese, steak and vegetables.

We all did shadow puppet pictures for Reagan on the side of the tent with flashlights, and then HONK SHEW, HONK SHEW. (snoring)

Now we are all sitting out in the dark watching the sky for shooting stars. Awesome.

Reagan is a non-stop screaming machine today and I’m not feeling well at aaaallllllllllll. Every time I lay down in the car Reagan smacks me in the face.

There were so many buffalo! I’m guessing we’re going to have 102 pictures from this trip.

Hey we’re at the hotel. It has a pool also. YAY!

****So then Jackie’s mom hijacked the blog to let you all know that despite her bee sting really bugging her (see what I did there?) today and the short installment for Day 3, she had a good time with us at Yellowstone National Park. We got lots of smiles and “wow, that’s cool!” Which is a win in my book. See you all tomorrow! ~Lisa

On our way to Yellowstone we stopped at a rest stop and we found a grass patch and played some catch and there was a bunch of bees and I knew it was coming, then it hit me. SCREAMMM!!!
A bee stung me on the bottom of the toe. I was crying for a solid 15 minutes. WORST TRUCK STOP EVER!!!! Aaaaaaaaaaand we’re back in the car. Whew!

IT HURTS SO BAD!!!!!!!!!

And 1000 hours later (5 hours) “now entering Montana”!

I think the bee sting and some pain added some excitement to this blog. Don’t you think?